Fortifying her core, she sips a poverty of water,
muting the fresh-corn brilliance of her body
with white curtains. She awaits a joy bobbin
to hover at her concentric breast. She knows
a scarred Saturday implies renewal.
Instincts tell her: wait, respire, listen.
Turning her face skyward, she takes
her mother’s gifts: rain, the hum of bees.
Maria S. Picone has an MFA from Goddard College. She’s interested in cultural issues, identity, and memory. As a Korean adoptee in an Italian American family and a New Englander, her obsessions with noodles, seafood, and the ocean are hardly her fault. Her poetry appears in Homestead Review, Ariel Chart, Headline Poetry, Mineral Lit Mag, and Route 7 Review. Her Twitter is @mspicone, and her website is mariaspicone.com.
This poem is from our first print collection
of poetry, “Thought For Food”, an anthology
benefiting Denver Food Rescue. To support
our fundraiser, please visit this link.
I avoided speaking for fear of communication
or maybe humiliation.
I didn’t know how to talk
or specifically
to speak their language without reprisal.
Slipping up in our household was tantamount to losing
and losing was bad
and bad is how I felt
for much of my life.
See shame runs deep
in my family
which
coincidentally is quite a shame.
Who is this Bruce Sterlingcharacter? Some call him philosopher, some call him dad. Nobody calls him a poet but that doesn’t stop him from crafting lines into something just about good enough to read. Without any formal training he seems to hold his own at the beloved Writer’s Block’s weekly writing events. He’s known to say, “Spending time with the poetry community is the only sane thing to do in this world. It fosters creativity, acceptance and huge amounts of love and frankly not much else matters.” Bruce is published in Spit Poet and Writer’s Block zines.
This poem is from our first print collection
of poetry, “Thought For Food”, an anthology
benefiting Denver Food Rescue. To support
our fundraiser, please visit this link.
They gather in an alley, at midnight, under the full moon,
To read dirty haiku and make a ruckus in the streets.
Rebels!
But they are caring rebels.
Tonight, I found the alley poets
And took a dose of love.
How are you feeling? they ask.
Good, I say.
(Good is always the right answer, the work answer.)
No, tell us how you really feel.
Depressed.
That’s better, because it’s honest. Now come here:
“Every day, we’ll show you a moment so golden you must close your eyes to see it.”
I must stick around for that day.
Why is death such a theme in poetry?
Why does the depressed mind latch onto it,
Instead of the beauty in the words, the rhymes, the repetition?
Why is it so easy for pain to enter,
For negative feelings to take root like weeds,
For the analytical mind to try and rationalize the irrational?
The alley poets tell me a ghost story:
About the monster “that which follows”!
Stalking the cities, the towns, the towers
For those souls whose hearts have turned to stone.
It is insatiable, all-consuming, leaving destruction in its wake.
But they also tell me:
“That which follows” hates fire, warmth, light, love.
So, the alley poets light a campfire.
We sing and dance and read,
Keeping the darkness at bay.
Not to sound cliché
But the poems they recite,
Are the stars between the clouds at night.
They hug me tightly as I take my leave,
Encouraging: I must carry the ember until the next time
The community comes together.
The upbeat music starts to play,
Because…”that which follows” has no chance
Against the alley poets!
ChelseaCook grew up on the coast of Virginia, but now calls the mountains of Colorado home. She has been writing poetry since high school, and has been active in the Boulder open mic scene. She is currently finishing the draft of her first novel.
This poem is from our first print collection
of poetry, “Thought For Food”, an anthology
benefiting Denver Food Rescue. To support
our fundraiser, please visit this link.
The first nine months
Of our life
Was spent
In quarantine
Nurtured by the wisdom
Of our mother’s mothers
Nutrified by the Earth
Suckling
As one being in body
Organic
In nature.
Symbiotic
Symbol of continuation.
Why
Have we not returned
Awareness to the womb
In these times
Seek the divine dark
From which the spark of life
Was bourne?
Why
Have we not sought
The wisdom of those who came
Before separation
Before degradation
And desecration of mind
And spirit?
Why
Have we not embraced
The girth of the earth
Beneath our feet?
Learn of what this bigness
Be. Hear what the bees
Buzz; news
Of the Ancient Ascent
And the absence
Of each.
Noise.
Uttered in tongue
And misidentified meaning
Ideological demons
Occupying the homes
Turned house–
The bodies
Turned louse–
Parasitic
Prophet of death
And termination
Living in the fauna
Of our mouths.
Hands balled into fists
Tightness taught us
To savor our anger
As a way to resist
The falling dominoes
And kingdoms
Devoid of glory and
fortified, sanctified
Foundation
Tumbling– remains
Creating another story–
Debris, and crumbs
Of those numbed
Translated as the way
To salvation.
And thus, the birth of this new nation.
Always and always
More and more
Preaching the gospel of lonely
And fragmentation
Disintegration of awareness
Assimilation of fear
Abandonment of what is
In search of what was never there—
Perfection in the flesh
Salvation in what we can hold
What we can mold
From our dastardly desires— …………..A kingdom foretold …………..Whose fall approaches.
In the wombs of our rooms
Let us croon ourselves into
Gestation
Into carry
Into hold
Let us sing, sing, sing
Lullabies of light light light
And drift, drift, drift
into the silence of the Darkness
That brought us to be
Behind every word that we speak
Let us abandon every pit- ……………………………………………ting against
Form us into I
Into one
Into yo soy
Io sono
Je suis
Daughter and Son
Husband and Wife
Mother and Father
Sister and Brother
man/woman
Divinity made flesh
Masculine-Feminine
Oneness in our chest
And from this cavity …………………………………..—this hollow—
That breathes
Blood and remembrance
Let us grow our seeds.
Melissa Ferrer is a renegade with hippie tendencies. Through poetry she seeks to provide a sense of solidarity to all people, encourage people to act unto peace and love, and foster community among both the like and unlike minded. Recently, she’s been yearning to set down her ego and replace it with a jubilation of the spirit. She wants you to join in, in whatever capacity you can.
This poem is from our first print collection
of poetry, “Thought For Food”, an anthology
benefiting Denver Food Rescue. To support
our fundraiser, please visit this link.
to a woman who has just lost her finger climbing over a chain-link fence crossing the border into Texas.
to the dusty rubble, and everything beneath, moments after a bomb has incinerated a home.
to a sun-washed bedroom where a seven year old child has just died of cancer in his mother & father’s arms.
Poetry is not just metaphor and meter, allegory and alliteration.
Poetry is access:
to the secret hobbies of protozoans.
to the color of chlorophyll.
to the lover you secretly yearn for but know will destroy you.
to enough magic to bring your cat back from a velvet bag of ashes embroidered with his name.
A poem can only be
what it can access.
Cortney Collins is a poet living in Longmont, CO. A four-time winner of Fort Collins’ First Friday Poetry Slam at The Bean Cycle, her work has been published by South Broadway Ghost Society, Amethyst Review, Devil’s Party Press, Back Patio Press, 24hr Neon Mag, The Naropa Vagina Monologues Zine, and is forthcoming in Tiny Spoon Lit Mag. During these strange and surreal times, she hosts a weekly poetry virtual open mic, Zoem. She shares a home with her beloved cat, Pablo, and tries to eat just the right amount of kale.
This poem is from our first print collection of poetry, “Thought For Food”, an anthology benefiting Denver Food Rescue. To support our fundraiser, please visit this link.
grape grape
apple apple
pomegranate blues
smokin’ in the alleyway
moonlit dancin’ shoes
mint mint
lemon lemon
garlic ginger waltz
old man in the dining hall
says it’s not his fault
citrus citrus
honey honey
echinacea poem
cursed if you go out to play
blessed if you stay home
lime lime
dandelion
stingin’ nettle song
bright eyed baby lookin’ up
wonderin’ what went wrong
Photo Credit: Bri Erger, Open Dialogue Project
Brett Randell is a writer and musician who loves to play in regular venues, on rooftops, at yoga festivals, in bars, living rooms, and beyond. He is currently working on a novel while part of The Book Project at The Lighthouse Writer’s Workshop. Brett’s writing has appeared in Stain’d Magazine, Interkors, and The Blue Lake Review.
This poem is from our first print collection
of poetry, “Thought For Food”, an anthology
benefiting Denver Food Rescue. To support
our fundraiser, please visit this link.
South Broadway Ghost Society 